Jurrens tells Rotarians about writing

December 27, 2013

When Joel Jurrens' crime novel In The Sticks debuted his writing career a couple years ago, some people may have thought the former Emmet County sheriff's deputy would use his many years of police work to continue writing strictly in the same genre.

Well, they were wrong.

Jurrens, of Estherville, speaking to Estherville Rotarians Thursday, has recently released two more novels County Ops, the story of a member of Seal Team 6 who returns for his mother's funeral only to learn she was murdered, and which Jurrens compares to Homeland and Taken, and Graves of His Personal Liking, the story of two young men who set out to strike it rich in the Dakota Territory goldfields. In The Sticks is available both as an e-book and in print, locally at Simply Unique in Estherville, while his other two books are available as e-books.

Jurrens said he generally writes two books at a time.

"I write when I feel like writing," he said, adding, "There is absolutely no creativity to editing" which he considers as a totally different process from writing.

Taking audience questions, Jurrens said he's working on a sequel to In the Sticks, a story of how a small-town deputy solves the murder of a beautiful woman with a mysterious past.

Jurrens, who has written short stories as well, said it's a totally different process in which the writer has to develop a character within a couple lines.

Jurrens said he tries not to read other writers' work when he's finishing a book because he doesn't want to be influences by someone else's style.

See Joel Jurrens' Web site at inthesticks.net or his blog at thewritingdeputy.wordpress.com.